Who Wrote the Southern Manifesto?

Who Wrote the Southern Manifesto?

John Kyle Day

Publisher:

University Press of Mississippi

DOI:10.14325/mississippi/9781628460315.003.0004

Historians neither agree upon who conceived of the the Southern Manifesto nor who actually wrote it. Most of the members of the U.S. Senate’s Southern Caucus claimed to have played a part in its drafting, while some alleged that they conceived of the project in the first place. This chapter unravels the mystery over who actually wrote the Southern Manifesto, analysing the existing scholarship and presumptions toward the document. This chapter uses all of the relevant historical evidence to reveal who in the Southern Caucus are the actual authors. The evidence reveals that though the committee of Sens. Richard Russell, Jr. of Georgia, John Stennis of Mississippi, and Sam Ervin of North Carolina were the principle authors, every member of the Southern Caucus who signed the document made significant contributions, including J. William Fulbright, Spessard Holland, J. Strom Thurmond, and Price Daniel.

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